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NEWSROOM

ICF International has made some job offers and anticipates management employees will be on the job by June 6.

Al Blankenship, the company’s program director of Market Research Business Processing (MRBP) and the local service center, said the process of setting the company up locally is “going real well. We have interviewed some people” and “made a few job offers, mainly to the management staff.”

“We are expecting them to come on board no later than June 6, and some will start on June 1,” Blankenship said Wednesday.

Any remaining members of the leadership and/or management staff will be working before June 15, as will some staff, he said.

“By July 1, we have a large number, probably 100 (employees), coming on board by then,” Blankenship said.

The company is leasing space in the Patrick Henry Mall until a new facility is built for ICF on Lot 6 in the Patriot Centre industrial park.

Blankenship said ICF expects to break ground on the building within the next weeks. Construction is expected to be completed by December.

Last month, the company announced it would locate in Henry County and create 539 jobs over the next three years and make a more than $15 million capital investment.

ICF held two job fairs to fill the first 100 slots, and employees were to begin training mid-May.

However, installing the infrastructure for the information and technology computers at the mall space, running the circuit into the building, connecting the internal wiring and ensuring each terminal is connected took a little longer than anticipated, he said.

The installation represented “just a little delay in hiring,” Blankenship said. “It was a little later than we anticipated, but once we get up and running,” he anticipates the company’s plans will continue to stay on track.

“We just got circuit hot (connected)” on Tuesday, and “hooked up the first 10 computers,” he said.

He explained the IT (information technology) circuit must be installed into the building, and in this case, into the company’s data room.

The circuit was installed Tuesday, and Blankenship said his computer and telephone now are connected to it. “We have checked all the other stations to make sure they are” ready to be connected to phones and computers, Blankenship said.

He anticipates 150 computer stations will be delivered to the temporary location in the next two weeks. Those systems are configured for “soft phones,” he said, explaining that they basically are headsets rather than desk phones.